Two Confederate ironclad rams, the CSS Palmetto State and the CSS Chicora, unleash a surprise assault Jan. 31, 1863, on Union forces blockading Charleston, S.C., where the Civil War began in 1861. The Palmetto rammed one Union ship, firing into the vessel and disabling it. The other ironclad went for a second Union ship, showering it with enough artillery shells that it had to be towed away. After trading fire with Union foes for a while, the low-slung Confederate rams retreated to the safety of Charleston Harbor with only minor damage. The Confederate vessels briefly vexed the Union blockade of Charleston harbor — part of a larger federal effort to shut off Confederate ports from supplying themselves with arms, ammunition and other goods by blockade runners. Also this week 150 years ago in the Civil War, Southern newspapers crowed over the rebel success in recently stopping Union Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside from crossing the Rappahannock River toward Richmond, Va., seat of the Confederacy. Burnside's offensive bogged down in thick mud after heavy winter rains, prompting him to be sacked shortly after the abortive expedition in January 1863. "Yankee Army Stuck in the Mud," boasted one headline in the "Daily Constitutionalist" newspaper of Augusta, Ga. It added: "The Yankees were prevented from crossing the Rappahannock owing to the impassable conditions of the roads. Our correspondent says that it was impossible to draw an empty wagon through the dreadful mud. The whole army was stuck fast."